


the truth about your heart

by alljuststars (allthelight)



Category: Gallagher Girls Series - Ally Carter
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Canon, it's buenos aires timeee
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-28
Updated: 2020-06-28
Packaged: 2021-03-04 12:00:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24969337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allthelight/pseuds/alljuststars
Summary: "“Let me help you,” she says quietly, but even with his back to her she can still see him stiffen.He says nothing and she resists the urge to roll her eyes, coming to stand in front of him now. Even in the dark the haggard look on his face is clear to see. Stubbornly, he refuses to look at her. He tries to reach the dressing again, and fails.“I know you’re still mad at me, but last I checked we were still partners. Let me help you.”Looking at her for a long moment, his eyes still piercingly blue, he eventually hands her the packet of dressings. Not quite a peace offering but the best he’s willing to give. At this point, she’ll take anything."It's Buenos Aires. Or a part of it anyway.
Relationships: Abigail Cameron/Edward Townsend
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	the truth about your heart

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this one written for a while but I've never been entirely happy with it for reasons I don't know why. It's not entirely what happened, but it's a little bit of the aftermath. I'm obsessed with it, what can I say? One day I'll write something about the two of them that isn't related to it but today is very much not that day... oops.
> 
> Thank you for all your kind words and I hope you enjoy it!

If Abby had been asleep, then it would have been the crinkling of the wrapper that would have woken her up, or the restrained grunts coming from the end of the bed, indicating someone trying to move quietly but without success. But she isn’t asleep, and so she sits up, wincing as she does, and tries to focus on the shape in the dark, waiting for it to come into focus before she moves, even though she knows exactly who it belongs to.

In only her shorts and t-shirt, shivering slightly at the cool night air, she gingerly makes her way to the end of the bed. Townsend sits there, shirt off and a packet of open dressings beside him. He tries to reach the one currently taped to his left shoulder blade but without success, and growls in frustration when he can’t.

“Let me help you,” she says quietly, but even with his back to her she can still see him stiffen.

He says nothing and she resists the urge to roll her eyes, coming to stand in front of him now. Even in the dark the haggard look on his face is clear to see. Stubbornly, he refuses to look at her. He tries to reach the dressing again, and fails.

“I know you’re still mad at me, but last I checked we were still partners. Let me help you.”

Looking at her for a long moment, his eyes still piercingly blue, he eventually hands her the packet of dressings. Not quite a peace offering but the best he’s willing to give. At this point, she’ll take anything.

Flicking on the bedside lamp, she can see so much clearer the injuries he would barely allow her to glance at during the day. The bruises are starting to form now, the red patches have become deep, nauseous purple. The cuts and scrapes look raw, rough and angry at the edges. The dressing on his shoulder blade is dirty, the blood visible through the other side. It’s all such a mess.

Gently she starts to peel it off, trying to ignore the little hisses he makes. Edward Townsend doesn’t show his pain if he can help it, and not for the first time she wonders just how injured he is.

When she does manage to free it, the sight of the raw wound underneath makes her want to gag and slap the dirty dressing back on. The ‘graze’ he made it out to be is more like a gouge, and the skin is angry and red. Abby isn’t afraid of blood, isn’t even the tiniest bit squeamish, but this makes her want to be sick.

“Well look at you 007,” she jokes instead. “You might finally have your own very cool scar.”

Townsend doesn’t say anything, not that she was expecting him to. He shivers very slightly when she touches the bare skin of his back, dabbing antiseptic cream gingerly.

“You better hope this is gonna cut it.” She can’t make herself stop. Rachel always says she has a smart mouth. “It’s hard to look cool if you have sepsis.”

He still says nothing and it’s freaking her out. She can handle it when they argue, in fact she even enjoys it. She can handle the anger and the shouting and the fierce look in his eyes. She can’t handle the silent stillness, not as though he doesn’t know her, but as though she isn’t there at all.

“Yup. Definitely think this one will be a scar. I wouldn’t worry though. I hear the ladies love a scar.”

Her voice just floats away into the dead air. Townsend doesn’t even move. Suddenly she has an urge to shake him by his shoulders and scream s _ay something_ but she doesn’t. She doubts it would work anyway. He’s like a stone.

She replaces the dressing, letting her fingers linger just a little too long at the edges when she smooths down the tape. His skin is cool to the touch. Less than twenty-four hours ago she awoke in this very hotel room pressed against his chest. His skin was warm then, warm and soft and the only thought in her mind was _home._

Abby’s angry at him, too, but it’s not the same and she won’t be deliberately obtuse and pretend it is. She’s the one that broke mission protocol and took the stupid risk, but she’s also the one that got more than a little banged up for it. She feels that the scales have been almost balanced in that regard.

She puts the wrappers and blood-soaked gauze in the bin and comes to stand in front of him. He hasn’t moved an inch, hasn’t even replaced his t-shirt. Abby’s surprised he hasn’t requested a new hotel room. Then again, neither has she.

“You’ll have to speak to me at some point, you know,” she says softly, barely teasing. “You might as well just get it over and done with now.”

He says nothing, still, but he does look at her. His eyes are so brilliantly blue that they feel as though they pierce right through her, searching deep into her soul and rooting out her most intimate thoughts. Several times she has gone to tell him about the effect his eyes have on her, and every time the words have just gotten to the tip of her tongue before she swallows them back down. She wonders if he knows, anyway. He’s the type of man to know things, even when they haven’t necessarily been said.

“It’s gonna be a long plane ride home if we’re not speaking,” she says, leaning back against the flimsy hotel desk that stands three-legged against the wall. “Eleven hours of silence. That’ll kill your ego.”

“I’m not going back with you. I’m going straight to London.”

It’s strange to hear his voice. She was starting to think she might never hear it again.

“Oh,” she says, swallowing her disappointment. “I just thought-”

“It’s nothing personal. Strictly business.” But his voice suggests it’s anything but.

“Of course it isn’t. Just like you not speaking to me all day isn’t personal either.”

She’s sure the remark hurt her more than it did him. The skin on her face is swollen and stretched tight, it hurts to speak, but she’s never been one to leave things well alone. She supposes if she were then they wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place.

Suppressing the urge to wince, to betray any sign of weakness in front of him, she glares at him instead. He meets her fiery stare with one of his own, icy and cool. They are so different from each other, and most of the time all it leads to is bickering and the occasional slamming of a door. They have worked missions before, and their different approaches, while frustrating, deliver results. This is the first time it is not so.

“I’ve already said everything I need to.” Townsend’s voice is just as icy. If Abby weren’t so angry, maybe she would shiver. “I don’t see the point in dragging it out.”

“No, you wouldn’t, would you? You don’t see the point in making anything last.”

He presses his lips together hard. “There’s no need to be petty, Abigail.”

“I wasn’t aware I was being petty,” she says innocently, though she knows fine well she was. “I was simply stating a fact. Making things last doesn’t appear to be something you’re very interested in.”

Townsend looks like he wants to say something, but he swallows it down. “If that’s how you feel.”

His cool anger is infuriating. Abby wants him to be red-hot, the way he was in the car on the way home from the hospital or outside in the hotel courtyard. She wants his burning rage to scald her skin and ignite her own rage also. She wants to feel anything other than this cold disappointment and shame she feels in the pit of her stomach.

But she really doesn’t want him to be angry at her, and she doesn’t want to be angry at him. She just wants to go back to _before,_ when they woke up pressed together in a way that was warm and safe. This thing between them has never been labelled, they’re both not accustomed to that, but it’s so _real._ Or at least it was.

“I’m sorry the guy got away, okay?” She says, flinging her hands up in the air. “I know it was an important asset and I’m sorry.”

He looks at her incredulously, one corner of his mouth rising in disbelief. The look only lasts for a second, but then he shakes his head. “You never bloody listen, do you?”

 _Here we go_ she thinks. “Excuse me?”

“If you think I’m angry because one man got away then you really haven’t been listening to anything I’ve said.”

She folds her arms against her stomach, trying not to wince as she hits a particularly bruised spot. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“I don’t _care_ that he got away!”

“What?” Abby shakes her head out of disbelief. She’s sure that’s what he’s been angry about all this time, why he’s barely looked her in the eye or touched her since they’ve came back to the hotel. The man was an important lead for MI6, and Townsend had been banging on about catching him ever since they arrived. “Then what is your problem?”

He stands up and pulls on his t-shirt. Now that he’s standing it’s as though he towers above her. _The ego adds about an extra foot, I’d say,_ is what she teases him with. Standing here now, his height is more imposing than a joke, and she can’t imagine ever teasing him about it again.

“You broke mission protocol,” he hisses. “Not only that, but you broke it spectacularly. You took a risk that was only as stupid as it was dangerous and it did not pay off.”

Abby feels her brows come together in confusion. “So you’re angry at me breaking protocol, but not the fact that it led to the man getting away? I had a damn good reason for what I did.”

“No,” he says. “You didn’t.”

She stands in front of him, so close that they’re toe-to-toe. Townsend has to look down and she has to look up but they meet each other’s eyes unflinchingly. “I think you’re forgetting that I saved your life while I was at it.”

It’s not like she was expecting a _thank you_ or a _good work, Abs,_ but she was expecting a little more than him leaning even closer and telling her, “You shouldn’t have done that.”

She’s too stunned to say anything, to do anything other than think _did he really just say that?_ Because she thought they were partners, and she thought they cared for each other, and she thought that when one of them was about to be killed, the done thing was to save them, no matter what.

But clearly that was just her own take on their relationship, and clearly she was wrong. Townsend obviously has a very different view about what they are.

“Is it because I’m a woman?” She seethes, reaching for the first plausible reason. “You can’t handle getting your ass saved by a woman?”

He scoffs, a blast of warm air in her face. “Of course not.”

“Then what? Because I’m your- ” She stops, because she can’t bring herself to do the thing they’ve been avoiding for so long. “Because it’s me? You can’t handle being saved by me?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Abigail.”

“I’m not. I’m genuinely asking. What is it that’s so unbearable about being saved by me?”

He shakes his head. “That isn’t what I’m saying.”

“Then say it clearer,” she hisses. “If somebody else-”

“ _Anybody!”_ He cries, and she feels the force of it tear right through her. It stops her in her tracks and her mouth hangs open and she doesn’t know what to do with it and evidently he doesn’t either because he shudders a little and says, in a voice so unlike his own, “Anybody else would have had the sense to do exactly the opposite of what you did today.”

It doesn’t land the way it should, though, because they have both heard what he so very almost said. It leaves her a little breathless.

“You were about to be killed,” she says, and though her voice is quiet it is anything but soft. “I wasn’t expecting a thank you, but it would have been nice. It’s all you had to say. Just _thank you._ ”

His hand comes up to cup the side of her face, barely touching. It feels like the caress of a ghost, something ethereal, not entirely real. His thumb gently grazes the underside of the dressing placed there, and for a moment there’s no pain at all. There’s nothing. She doesn’t dare breathe, her heart doesn’t dare beat, the world doesn’t dare spin. There is silence.

“You got hurt,” he says at last. “That’s nothing to be thankful for.”

As much as she wants to lean into his touch and let it console her, she can’t do it, and she steps away.

“I’m a big girl,” she says, wishing that her voice was stronger and that it wasn’t wavering quite so much. “And I’m a damned good operative. I can handle getting hurt.”

And she wishes she were brave enough to add _for you._ But she doesn’t.

“Abs,” he breathes, and it’s that name in that voice, that rare display of a vulnerability she knows he’s afraid of possessing, that almost makes her weak at the knees and softens her anger. Almost. But he’s gone too far and insulted her ability, insinuated that she isn’t as strong as him, and the name isn’t enough to make her forget all of that.

If she wanted to ask him, and if he wanted to answer, she would know that it’s not really like that at all. Edward Townsend has never had anybody willing to die for him before, and never as readily. The image of her falling the way she did, the blood spreading over the ground, is seared into his eyelids, and he sees it every time he closes his eyes. Abby has a family that loves her and misses her, and the fact that she’d risk never seeing them again for him is more than he can bear. It’s not the fact that she saved him, it’s that he doesn’t want her to die doing it.

But Edward Townsend has never been an eloquent man, and he’s never been in touch with his feelings. He’ll never say it, and Abby will never ask, and they’re destined to stay in this middle ground, some awkward stalemate that both find more comfortable than anything else.

“No.” She holds out her hand, suddenly tired and heartsick. She has a sudden urge to call her sister. Rachel would know what to do. But she figures that even Rachel hasn’t figured out how to heal a broken heart. “Just no, okay?”

“It’s not-”

He starts, shakes his head, and stops.

“I wanna get some sleep before we – I – have to get the plane.” It’s like she’s in a daze as she moves back towards the head of the bed. “You should sleep in the bed cause of your shoulder and I’m uh, I’m gonna sleep here too because I’m sore and I don’t sleep well on planes.” She sniffs, resisting an urge to wipe her eyes. “It’s a big enough bed. We won’t meet each other.”

She gets into bed and pulls the duvet up around her neck tightly before he can say anything. She tries not to listen for him, but she finds herself waiting as he pulls off his shoes and she waits for the bed to dip as he climbs in. He doesn’t get under the covers, and she knows if she were to look around she would find him lying straight as a toy solider, eyes boring holes into the ceiling.

Eventually she falls into a terrible, awful sleep. It’s nightmare after nightmare, with one just rolling into the other without a moment’s reprieve. It’s Matt begging her to save him only she can’t reach him in time, and then it’s Rachel pointing an accusing finger at her, blaming her for it, and then it’s Cammie, a much younger Cammie, hiding behind her mother, looking at the aunt she always laughs and smiles at with such trepidation in her eyes that Abby can feel her heart physically break in two.

It’s a whole mix of painful, untrue memories boiling over and the one person that could maybe make it better is the one person that isn’t speaking to her and that she isn’t really speaking to either. When she jerks awake, she expects dead air, cool sheets where he’d supposed to be but isn’t. And the sheets are cool, the space next to her is empty, but there is a comforting hand on her arm, stroking very gently back and forth.

“Sh,” he soothes lowly. “Shh. You’re alright. I’m here.”

And she wants to jerk away, to roll over and be by herself, but she really, really doesn’t. So she compromises by closing her eyes and breathing deeply and just enjoying the sensation on her arm as she tries to fall back to sleep. And she does. And she does not dream.

She awakens when he moves. She watches as he moves silently through the dark, putting his things into his rucksack as silently as the good operative he is. He’s like her in this way – he doesn’t do goodbyes, either.

But something has changed today. This is more final. There is a chance that, when he leaves, she will never see him again. There has always been a chance of that, but this is a bigger chance than most.

It’s a lot to ask a spy to love. It’s why she never has. She’s never asked him for anything that she wouldn’t want him to ask from her. It feels like she might have done it anyway.

He looks to her, checking she’s asleep most likely, but doesn’t look surprised to see her staring at him through the night. He nods, once, and then goes to the door.

“Where did you go?”

The question does what she hoped it would, and he stops before the door he hasn’t opened yet, though his hand lingers on the door handle. He doesn’t look at her. Abby struggles up onto her elbows, not even caring that she winces audibly. She’s grateful he doesn’t look, because if he did, she might not have the strength to go on.

“At the hospital,” she continues, “when you thought I was…” Here she stops, swallows, and tries to convince herself she’s imagining the look on his face. “Protocol dictates that I shouldn’t have been alone, especially not when our target got away. But you left.” Her eyes and tone are soft, pleading very gently for an answer. “Where did you go?”

“Crazy.” His voice is even softer, His voice is even softer, and it’s as though he doesn’t mean to say it, isn’t aware he’s saying it at all. His eyes are closed and his face is haunted and it’s not just the memory of breaking his precious rules that does it. It’s something else. Abby can feel her heart aching in her chest. “I went crazy.”

She thinks he’ll turn around, offer more answers, get angry again and call her irresponsible and selfish and all othe things he has thrown at her in the past, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t look like the man she knows, the uptight spy who prides himself on being the best and isn’t afraid of showing it. He looks like a man who’s seen his own death, who has felt it brush past him and whisper in his ear. He looks as though he has held his own heart in his hands, and watched as it stopped beating and turned to dust.

There are things she wants to say, but they are things she knows she never can. There will always be secrets between them, always things left unsaid. It’s better this way. It has to be this way.

She watches as he leans against the door for no more than a second, letting it take all his weight, and she watches as he stands up straight again. She watches as he shoulders his rucksack, not even letting himself wince as he hoists it onto his injured shoulder. She watches as he takes a deep breath and then strides through the door, never, not for one single second, looking back.

**Author's Note:**

> I couldn't resist the reference! Like father like son I guess!


End file.
